MovieChat Forums > Runaway Jury (2003) Discussion > One scene that always bothered me in thi...

One scene that always bothered me in this movie...


The scene where Nick finds Doyle going through his stuff pretending to be the cable guy.

Now, I know they tried to explain it with the judge mentioning he was ending 45 minutes early, but with the complexity of Fitch's setup there, the level of technology, staff, and surveillance, you'd think that someone there would have said "Hey, what about the guy we just sent to Easter's apartment?"

They've got people and cameras in the courtroom, they're watching and scrutinizing every second of the trial, but when the jury is released early, and the trial is over for the day, no one thinks about the guy that was sent to search one of the juror's homes? The juror who they believe is there to manipulate the jury and obviously knows about their operation?

It just seems completely unlikely that these professional jury tamperers would be so careless to let that happen. And then we see that Doyle even has a cell phone later when he calls Fitch from Indiana. So it's not like they even thought of getting him out of there but just couldn't reach him, they just apparently didn't even think of telling him that Nick Easter was going to be home in a few minutes.

Even just a call that he ignores because he's busy, or a call he takes but says "I'm almost done copying his files," or maybe Nick catching him on his way OUT of the place instead of walking in and finding him, maybe someone makes a call but they see his phone vibrating/ringing on a table a few feet away showing that he forgot it... any of that would have been much more plausible than Nick showing up without him having any warning.

reply

That is a great point and one I completely missed.

reply

Agree. They are about 20-30 people working on this case. And they are not clever enough to break into his apartment when he is a jury duty?

reply

Because its a movie. Not real life. Had they informed the guy to get out of there would be a lot less tension for the viewer.

reply

yeah, could they not even have a simple spotter for the guy!

Because its a movie. Not real life. Had they informed the guy to get out of there would be a lot less tension for the viewer.


^^this is the reason.

reply

Why not simple hubris?

They were a team of longtime professionals who'd been getting away with their tactics, unopposed, for years

A bit of carelessness seems more than credible at least that early in the film

Fitch claims that he rarely underestimates people, but the whole film is about him underestimating Nick and Marley right up until the wire transfer goes through

It's a classic con-the-conman plot

reply